TO HIS EXCELLENCY SIR GEORGE GREY, K.C.B.

15

A.—No. 6

the Colony. I learn with pleasure that Mr. Weld had formed a new Colonial Ministry, on principles which you regarded as being in conformity with the instructions you luid received,* and that he expected that Ministry would command a large majority in tho Assembly. In the speech which, by the advice of your Ministers, you addressed to the Assembly, in the answers of the two Houses to that speech, and in the resolutions adopted by ths House of Representatives, I recognise what is, I trust, the commencement of a happier condition of public affairs. I agree in your opinion that these resolutions substantially accept the policy which Her Majesty's Government have instructed you to carry into effect in the Colony, i am gratified to see that the Assembly recognize the assistance rendered to them by the Mother Country, and cordially appreciate the gallant services performed by Her Majesty's land and naval forces. T have great pleasure in acknowledging, on the part of Her Majesty's Government, the gallant conduct and effective services of the forces raised in New Zealand, and the spirited exertion the Colony has made to meet the very heavy expenditure which has been thrown upon it. You will have learnt from my former Despatches, that I entirely adhere to the decision of the Duke of Newoastle upou the subject of the responsibility of directing and controlling the Native policy of the Colony, which has been accepted by the Assembly in its last session ; and you will have had no difficulty in assuring your Ministers that the Assembly was well justified in expressing its confident trust that the instructions given to you, uu the part of Her Majesty s Government, in my Despatches of 26th April and 26th May were issued to meet a temporary emergency, and may lapse the moment a normal state of tilings shall bo restored in the Colony. You rightly attach great importance to these resolutions of the Assembly. In admitting the claim of the Imperial Govtrnment to exercise a reasonable control over policy upon which the restoration of peace must necessarily depend, whilst the Colony is receiving the aid of British troops for the suppression of internal disturbance, they have, I trust, re-established harmony between the authorities, whose divided counsels were a cause of so much regret; and in resolving to make every possible further effort to place the Colony in a position of self-defence against internal aggression, they adopt the course best calculated to relieve the Home Government from responsibilities which we have most unwillingly assumed, and from an interference in the internal affairs of the Colony which nothing but a paramount sense of duty would ever have induced us to exercise. You ma) assure the Assembly that these resolutions have been received by Her Majesty's Government wiih entire satisfaction. I await with great interest the receipt of your further intelligence, when time shall have been afforded to your Ministers to take practical measures for carrying this policy into effect. You have already made known to the insurgent Natives the general conditions on which their return to their allegiance will be accepted. I trust that now, in conformity with MrWeld's proposal, plans of the land, part of the territory belonging to the insurgents and now in military occupation, which you propose to obtain, either by cession or by confiscation, will be made public without delay, [t is impossible to expect even the commencement of a restoration of peace and order in the Colony until this first and most important step shall have been taken, until the colonists shall know what lands they have to occupy, and until the Native race shall feel assured that they are safe in the possession and peaceful occupation of all their remaiuing land. You will not fail to bring clearly before your Ministers and before the Assembly the conditions on which the Settlements Act has hitherto been left in operation by Her Majesty's Government. The permanent allowance of such an Act would be impossible, for the reasons assigned in my Despatch of 26th April, and I doubt not that I shall receive from you Acts adopted by the Assembly to which Her Majesty's sanction can be given. I am sure that so soon as these first steps shall have been taken, your Ministers will proceed to consider what precautions it may be desirable to take in order to prevent the recurrence of disputes liko that respecting the block of land at Waitara,—the unhappy origin of so much disaster to the Colony. I collect from the information which you have sent me that in the Waikato district, and also at Tauranga, military operations havo practically ceased ; and that all that now remains to bo done in these districts is, that you should give to both races that assurauce with respect to the lands to be acquired by confiscation or cession of which I have already spoken. In the north, notwithstanding the escape of the prisoners from Kawau, tranquility had not been bioken by any warlike operations on the part of any of the hitherto peaceful ai:d friendly tribes. On the other hand, the state of affairs in the district of Taranaki still guve occasion for much anxitty; and the restoration and maintenance of order in that district will evidently be one of the most serious questions with which your Advisers will have to deal. It is impossible not to be struck by the difficulty which has always attended the extension of settlement at this point; and I observe that Mr Weld attaches so much importance to the question that, in his original proposals to you, he bas made especial provision for the establishment of a strong military post, to be occupied by a Colonial force, in the centre cf the coast line. I doubt not that when tranquility shall have been restored your Ministers, before inviting the expenditure of fresh capital at Taranaki in preference to other sites, where from local circumstances this difficalty might not be experienced to the same extent, will carelully consider the means by which, after the Imperial troops shall have been withdrawn, the settlers are to be protected from the recurrence of attack. Your Miuisters have laid down, as the end towards which their measures will be directed, the eventual of the whole Imperial force. It will, no doubt, be necessary that this.